Aaaaaand....relax.

[Jonah King]

There was nothing like a shower and a change of clothes to make you feel better after a near-death experience.

Well, Jonah didn’t know if he and Mia had ever actually been in danger of dying, but from what he knew about the MSAD, it was not the kind of organisation you wanted to mess with. He had no intention of being killed by a terrorist group, and he was eternally grateful that both he and his best friend had come out of the occasion alive. It was almost enough to make a person turn religious.

But the terrifying events of the afternoon were already starting to fade a little in his mind (although Jonah didn’t think he would ever forget exactly how that cold, lung-clutching fear had felt when he had realised they were going to get caught), and while he was a little worried about the fact that he had actually used his telepathy, used it as a weapon…well. It was time to relax, and save that little issue for another day. He would think about it once his legs had stopped feeling like they were made out of jelly.

As he made his way to Mia’s room, though, he couldn’t stop thinking about it. He had never deliberately read anybody’s mind before. The only time he heard someone’s thoughts was when he couldn’t help it – physical contact between him and them, or a strong emotion from their side. Jonah had overheard more angry and erotic thoughts than he cared to think about (those being the most difficult to block), but he had never heard anything on purpose before. Maybe it was just self-defence – but if it was just self-defence, why did he feel like this?

Because he had enjoyed the power it had given him. Jonah had never been able to talk himself out of a situation, before.

Then he was standing in front of Mia’s door, and he pushed the debate to the back of his mind. He had more immediate things to concentrate on – namely, putting up every single block he could so that he would at least be able to attempt keeping her thoughts at bay. After a few drinks, she was louder than most. And although her mind was less easily translatable when sober, when she was drunk things could get…interesting. And not in a good way.

Let’s just say that when you have been watching Firefly with your closest friend, and seen her mental image of herself in flagrante delicto with a certain actor, you tend not to want to repeat the experience.

The routine of tapping out the code to unlock the door, heading in and sitting down was soothing. It meant that some things in the world were still the same, no matter what had happened half an hour ago. ’Hey,’ Jonah said as he opened the door, offering Mia a smile. ’Started on the booze, yet?’ he asked teasingly, unaccountably relieved to be in her room. The one thing they both needed at the moment was a semblance of stability.

He sat on the bed and threw a sack of Reese cups for her to catch: some things would never change.

[Mia Keystone]

Mia’s desire to shag Malcolm Reynolds brainless aside, the technopath had also gone with a shower and was just picking out a t-shirt when Jonah came in. Shrugging to herself, she just turned her back and pulled on the one she’d chosen, featuring a cartoon of a N64 cartridge and the words ‘blow me’ underneath, and turning back to her friend. It was funny because it had double meanings, ok? Only one of which was crude.

Her lip rings were back in, and while her lower lip looked a little swollen, then cut was hardly noticeable. Besides, it wouldn’t be the first time Mia had had unexplained cuts or bruises. The students would just assume she’d gotten into a bit of a scrap and wince with sympathy for whoever she’d scuffled with. If someone had pissed Mia off enough to get her to come out from behind the computer, it usually wasn’t pretty.

”King, you shouldn’t need to ask,” she answered with a smirk, raising the glass filled with bourbon and Dr Pepper that had accompanied her even to the shower. Never really one to want people to know how she was feeling, Mia was trying hard to hide the fact her legs were still unsteady. As for her hands? She was holding her glass tightly, to hide the tremors. The alcohol was already sitting nicely in her stomach, the tension and stiffness she’d felt in her lower back and shoulders after hiding under that stupid bed and the ache in her arm (she’d have a bruise) melting away.

The packet hit Mia’s hand and bounced off onto the floor. ”Uncool, King,” Mia groaned and set her drink on her desk before bending to pick up the chocolatey goodness. Still, she couldn’t keep the stupid grin off her face. It was like start of term all over again, only without the whole ‘I may have aided a terrorist group’ hanging over their heads. Also, this time she had bourbon.

”Doya want something to drink?” Mia held up a mostly full two liter bottle of Dr Pepper and shook it in what was supposed to be a tempting manner. ”I have this, or, ah,” she frowned and thought hard. ”Yeah, I have this. You want it?” Not really waiting for an answer, she tossed the bottle onto the bed and sank into her chair, taking a long sip of her own drink. Given Mia’s size and somewhat insane metabolism (she lived on sugar and caffeine) it never really took long for her to start getting tipsy.

Leaning forward, Mia rested her head on her hands.”Ok, man, did you have like, a moment of ‘shit I should have...’ today? Like, drowning flashback or whatever? Her expression was faintly self depreciating, but also humorous. She wasn’t sure if he’d take it seriously or not. She wasn’t sure she meant it seriously anyway.

[Jonah King]

With a splutter and an expletive, Jonah turned away when he realised what state of undress Mia was in. He could feel his face going red, and gave a heavy sigh: sometimes he wondered if Mia enjoyed making him feel embarrassed. It wasn’t the first time she had done this to him, and he had the feeling that it wouldn’t be the last - she derived too much entertainment from it. When they were fifteen, she had gone through a phase of answering the door in only a towel, just so that she could laugh at him when he looked like he wanted to sink through the floor. But, he figured, at least if she was getting amusement from making fun of him, she wouldn’t seek it elsewhere…such as by getting herself into trouble.

He kept his eyes very firmly away from her until the movement of the bottle in her hands caught his eye. When she threw it to him he caught it, with the barest hint of a smug smile – he never missed anything when Mia threw it to him. The glasses were, as usual, on the shelf above the bed, and Jonah poured himself a drink. After a long swallow he settled back on the bed, kicking off his shoes and crossing his legs so that he could lean against the wall. How many times had be been seated in exactly this position, over the years? Surely too many to count.

Mia’s question prompted a rueful grin. ‘How many are you looking for?’ he asked – and although his eyes were full of humour, he knew that he was completely serious. They had had far more than their fair share of skirmishes with security within the school, but none of it had ever been as scary, as purely, heart-stoppingly dangerous, as breaking into the house of Anastasia van Drakke. Jonah paused for a moment, realising that they were now law-breakers. They were criminals. But they hadn’t been caught, and he would keep reminding himself of that fact for as long as he possibly could. They were safe, and nobody ever had to know what they were done. ’You?’ he asked Mia, and then offered a smile. ’At least you’ll have a story for when you join the CIA, or something.’ Jonah couldn’t imagine Mia working for any other organisation: it would give her a completely legal excuse to poke her nose into other peoples’ computers.

Something caught in his chest, and he looked away for a moment. ’I never used my telepathy like that before,’ he told her, although he knew that she must have realised that. If he could have avoided Mia’s gaze, he would have – but circumstances forced him to look back at her so that he could see if she said anything. Jonah had the feeling that Mia would not understand the moral difficulties he had with it (well, she might understand it, but she was unlikely to understand why he cared), but he couldn’t keep it inside. Mia was the only person he could talk to about it.

But they were in danger of too much doom and gloom. Jonah gave Mia a sudden smile, and shook his worries away like a dog shaking off water. ’So,’ he asked, smile not devoid of mischief. ’Found any more interesting information, around?’

[Mia Keystone]

Her face still turned away, Mia smirked at Jonah’s splutter. It was way too easy to rile him up sometimes. She’d sort of half expected him to be used to it by now; wasn’t like she didn’t wonder around her room in her underwear all the time. Funny how Jonah always covered his eyes before he came in during summer. There had to be a connection there somewhere...

Ha.

There was a Jonah sized dint in her mattress. It was a little problematic, given the fact Jonah was a good foot and a bit taller then her. Every few nights she’d wake up suddenly in the middle of the night when she slipped into the dent. It was the perfect kick, should Mia ever decide to start exploring dreams. It was also a testament as to how often Jonah had sat in that exact spot, drinking Dr Pepper as she sat in her own chair and drank... other things. It was their ritual, and it was comforting and safe...

Usually Mia found comforting and safe boring. It was unsettling to think about too much.

”I dunno,” She crossed her legs and rested her feet on the bed, sighing and sinking into her chair until her chin was practically resting on her chest. ”I mean,”, she looked up quickly and raised her eyebrows, ”Don’t think I’m forgetting I asked you first, but,” again, before she could finish her thought she paused and frowned ”CIA? Fuck off. Anyway...,” train of thought back on the tracks, she jiggled her foot slightly. ”Ending up in jail would sort of suck. I mean, shit, I should have checked my contacts to see who slipped through, I should have tried bungee jumping that one time, I should have,” Mia stopped abruptly and looked down at her drink, finishing it off with one go. ”You know, stuff. You?”

Her face felt warm. It had to be the alcohol. Still, even while Mia was furiously commanding her blood supply to leave her face that very instant or else, the short girl noticed the smile slip from his face. Her own frown twisted from frustrated to concerned (she had many frowns). ”Hey, dude,” she nudged his leg with her foot. ”You saved my ass with that.” And it was proof that Mia was trying to be nice because she didn’t even point out she’d done the same thing in a much more violent fashion years ago. ”Do you want to, ah,” her expression was rapidly becoming uncomfortable, ”I mean, I know you have issues with morals and shit like that but, you know,” shit, shit, shit I suck at this. Mia was trying to ask if he wanted to talk about his feelings, but the words just couldn’t form in her throat without making her gag.

”I mean, you’re like, touching people now and everything,” she went on, still sounding stilted. She was trying, damn it. Besides, she’d just realized something that was very, very important. Something she needed to ask straight away. ”So that’s getting better, right? Hey, maybe you can finally get your freak on!” Jonah having sex! The idea was hilarious... Totally hilarious... After all, at 16 he hadn’t even kissed anyone! That had been an interesting night...

”Ah,” Mia started, her feet slipping off the bed, ”Fuck no, King!” Her eyes were wide, her expression close to horrified. Was he asking if she was already repeating her mistake? Did he think she was that dumb? Was she not understanding the question? (Serious possibility) ”Like I’ll do that, or tell you! Could have gotten us arrested, dude. Could have been more then just a wall hitting me, or you in the face!” She was sounding.... protective. Oh geeze. More booze was needed. ”Ah, LaRousse spelt with the Pryo,” she muttered then turned to pour herself another very stiff drink and realised her word misuse. "I said slept, by the way. I may have stuttered."

[Jonah King]

It was rather novel to be in the position of ‘person who had saved’, rather than ‘person who needed saving’, but Jonah wasn’t going to embarrass Mia by making a big deal of it. Well, maybe a little – he allowed himself a broad, slightly smug smile when she pointed out that he had, indeed, saved her ass by using his telepathy.

Jonah had long since abandoned his ability when it came to understanding Mia. For the most part, he simply didn’t need to be a telepath to understand what she was saying to him (or, more to the point, what she wasn’t saying to him), because he could read her like a book. So when she trailed off, awkward, he knew exactly what she was trying to convey – and he was grateful for it. He hadn’t expected her to be so understanding. But he also knew that if he thanked her then she would instantly deny that that was what she had been offering. He settled for a warm smile in an attempt to communicate his thanks to her, and hoped that she would understand what he meant.

He made a face when she said he was getting better at touching people. So far Mia was the only person he had managed to touch without ‘spazzing’ – he had only been able to shake the security guard’s hand because he had been deliberately trying to get into the older man’s mind. Then the rest of what Mia said penetrated his brain, and he stared at her.

I’ve read her lips wrong. Yes, it had to be that. There was always a certain amount of intuition (he called it guesswork, but that was frowned upon by more serious members of the deaf community than he) called upon when lip-reading, and Jonah had obviously committed a common mistake.

There was no way Mia had just used the phrase ‘get his freak on’ in relation to him, Jonah. He had always been awkward about – ahem – physical activity, and even more awkward about mentioning it.

But why should he be surprised? After all, this was Mia, Mia who loved nothing more than to challenge him…

He knew she hated silence. She always resolutely refused to take silence as an answer, but Jonah couldn’t bring himself to reply – he merely blushed and looked away, unable to think of anything to say. Luckily by then she had moved onto another issue, and he frowned as she poured her drink, trying to work out who ‘the Pyro’ could be, and whether he had made yet another error in seeing what she had said. Spilled? Smelled? No, her lips had definitely made a hard ‘P’, which only left ‘spelt’…

Mia’s clarification made him grin. ’Had too much already?’ he asked teasingly, indicating her drink. As a subject change away from liaisons of any kind it was a pretty lame one, but he hoped it would work…

[Mia Keystone]

Maybe it was the bourbon, Mia would swear it was, but when Jonah beamed at her Mia’s cheeks felt hot. She scowled and kicked him lightly in the ankle, a very clear mention this ever and I’ll kill you gesture. Mia trying to be, well, nice, even to Jonah, was as rare as rocking horse shit and she liked to keep it that way. Made her feel all awkward and weird. Computers didn’t do that... they didn’t have emotions. So very very simple.

But it wasn’t only her who was feeling uncomfortable. OBVIOUS DEFLECTION DENYED! Her own frustration gone in an instant, the technopath grinned wickedly (not even wincing when the cut on her lip pulled). Did he really think she’d drop it that easily? Of course he didn’t. Jonah knew Mia was like a terrier with a rat when she wanted to know something; she’d worry it to death rather then let it go. Taking another long swig of her drink as he pointed at it, she laughed and shook her head.

Nice try, King

”That a yes? Is that a ‘yes Keystone, I’ve danced the horizontal tango?” she laughed, rocking forward in her chair. It was so unlikely, she knew, but he had to have at least kissed someone by now, right? The night was long and she had plenty of Dr Pepper and bourbon; if Jonah thought he could get out of this one, he was sadly mistaken.

Shaking her head and chewing on some chocolate peanut butter goodness, Mia contemplated listing possible positions (doggy style was the first on the list, for some reason Jonah just... seemed like that kind of person sometimes) but dismissed it. It was possible Jonah would actually spontaneously combust from embarrassment if she started saying things like the ‘backwards cowgirl’ or the ‘pile driver’.

”Come on, life and deaf experiences bring people together, dude,” she went on, speaking through splutters of laughter. ”You know about my love life, don’t hold out on me!” Calling it a love life was a stretch since the girl had a habit of kicking them out as soon as she got bored, which was almost always the next morning. It could get awkward if it wasn’t her place they’d crashed at but she managed.

Jonah, on the other hand... not being able to touch people without reading their minds could be a bit of a dampener. Mia knew that she would not want her partner to know what she was thinking... it often boiled down to god, would it kill you to go left? and you weigh a ton, time to switch over. Not a turn on. ”Come on, met anyone at any of those deaf parties you go to?”

And sure, maybe Mia was showing a little more then friendly interest, but it was the bourbon. It was always the bourbon.

[Jonah King]

The wicked smile Mia gave him made Jonah wince inside. He knew that smile all too well, and it never boded well for his sanity. It was the same smile she had given him the time she had told him about the first time she had had sex – an eye-wateringly embarrassing moment in Jonah’s life. (‘Hey, King! Guess what I did over the summer!’) He had actually resorted to closing his eyes that time, so that he didn’t have to see what she was saying to him. Unfortunately, when he had opened them again, he had seen to his chagrin that Mia had written up the whole experience on the nearest computer screen, and it was the first thing to confront him when he looked around.

He had yet to really, fully recover from that incident. It was scarred on his mind.

Jonah could feel his face growing hot – he was probably a very fetching shade of red by now. Mia’s mention of ‘love life’ got a small, sceptical smile out of him (the last word he would use to describe Mia’s encounters was ‘love’), but then she resumed her questions, and he found that he wanted nothing more than to close his eyes and avoid seeing what she was asking him. ‘Why are you so interested, anyway?’ he asked, attempting to evade the question for a little bit longer, in order to buy himself time to think about phrasing.

The trouble was, Mia had always been so good at talking about her own exploits that she had never asked Jonah about his before – there had been the occasional question, but it had never been anything Jonah couldn’t deflect with a shrug, or a shake of the head. For her to be demanding actual details was new, and he didn’t even bother to conceal his sigh as he resigned himself to the fact that this conversation was going to take place, whether he liked it or not. Mia was not going to let this one go. ‘I…’ he trailed off, feeling his face become (if possible) even redder than it had been. With a groan, he closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall.

You know perfectly well that I haven’t,[/i] he told her after a moment, using his ability to speak quietly into her mind, so that she would know that he was telling her the truth. He couldn’t lie when he spoke like this. It was also much easier than speaking aloud, and probably easier for Mia to listen to than his voice. Jonah looked back at her with a half-smile. Came fairly close a few times, but nothing happened, he elaborated, giving her a small shrug. He couldn’t work out why telling her this made him feel so uncomfortable – maybe because Mia was so experienced when it came to sex, and he actually felt a little intimidated by her, sometimes. Jonah was used to her knowing more than him, but this…this was different.

[Mia Keystone]

Mia’s grin cracked wider as Jonah started to cave in. Why AM I so interested? Because he was her best friend and it was nicer to ask then to start planting electronic bugs on his person, like Mia usually did when she wanted to find something out. That was actually a very good reason! She could use that one.

”Be glad I’m asking, not trying to find out,” she pointed out, raising an eyebrow. He was blushing fit to burst, and Mia had the fight the urge to giggle maniacally at how pink his ears were turning. This could be the best blush she’d induced in the older boy yet! Even better then that time she’d explained just how a girl knew when she’d lost her virginity. She’d thought he’d melt into a puddle on the floor and slip through the cracks. He had probably wanted to.

His mind message actually cheered her up; he’d tell her if he had. That was good to know. Mia was very protective of her things (friends were things, it worked, shut up) and if Jonah was going to start going out and doing the dirty, Mia wanted to know. So she could find the girl and tell her if she ever made Jonah sad, or gave him something gross, or got pregnant and expected Jonah to fork out she’d be very very sorry. Because that’s what friends did, they looked after each other and protected each other and helped each other out with issues like virginity...

Wait. Sidetrack.

Mia started a little and managed to catch Jonah looking up even as he spoke in her mind. ”Say what now?” The girl almost toppled out of her chair as she lent forward quickly. ”Who? When? What? Why?” She rattled off, finally pitching forward and face planting on the bed. She was up in seconds, glad her mother had insisted on a double mattress so there was room for her to sit cross legged like a primary schooler as she looked at Jonah in mild amazement and not so mild curiosity.

”Tell. Me. Everything.”

[Jonah King]

Jonah grinned. There were few advantages to his condition, but one which had become apparent on his knowing Mia was that very little in his life required sound from him – which left very little to bug. Any conversations with his family took place through the medium of e-mail, which could not be heard. Any conversations with other friends were, too, e-mailed (such as those to other deaf people he had met during the holidays), or spoken outside the confines of his room. Nothing to bug there, except maybe the act itself which – let’s face it – surely even Mia would be too squeamish to listen to. It’s all very well with strangers, but with your own best friend?

He hoped his logic would work with this one. Otherwise Mia was a lot stranger than he had thought.

When Mia gazed at him with something suspiciously like glee in her eyes, Jonah wondered if he should even have let slip as much as he had done about his – ahem – encounters. He stifled a laugh as she almost fell onto the bed (he knew that if he did laugh, she would find some unusual way of punishing him for it). Does it shock you that much? he asked dryly, watching as she pulled herself into an upright position and transferred herself from the chair to the bed. Uh-oh. That meant business, and somehow Jonah could guess what Mia’s next question was going to be….

‘Mia…’ his tone was one of protest, but he already knew that he was going to cave in. He always did, where Mia was concerned. It was like she was his own, personal truth serum. Looking back up at her, Jonah gave a small smile at the expectant look on her face. Mind-to-mind felt too…intimate for a discussion of this nature (he was having trouble enough blocking her out at this close range without making it even more difficult for himself), so he opted for speech.

‘There’s not much to tell,’ he began with a slight shrug, unwilling – and unable – to go into the detail he knew she would want him to. ‘I would get – we would get – up to a point, but it would be too…’ He couldn’t put it into words, somehow. Touching his forehead, Jonah signed /Noisy/ (Mia had known him long enough now to be able to work out the meaning), then mimed something pressing down on his head. He continued signing as he spoke: ‘I couldn’t see, or think, or…breathe.’ It had been overwhelming. Too much noise, too many sensations – and over it all, the complete inability to block out the girl. He hadn’t been able to take anything in, and for a moment he had felt completely paralysed. The second time had resulted in the same thing, and since then…

‘That was a year ago,’ he informed Mia, letting his hands drop to rest on his knees. ‘Nothing since.’

[Mia Keystone]

It did surprise Mia, actually. Not so much that Jonah was getting any, because he was sort of cute in a goofy, tall sort of way, but that he hadn’t told her. They told each other most stuff! Sure, Mia wouldn’t tell him every detail about what she got up to if she thought it would get him in trouble or something but apart from that... Jonah had told her when he had that brief crush on the recruiter Midori and Mia had told him that time she had almost slept with a 50 year old guy. They shared that sort of shit. And a part of her was, well...

That feeling where your stomach lurched a bit and you wanted to eat an entire block of chocolate.

Still, when he started to complain she just help up one finger to silence his complaints, shaking her head. She was going to hear about this if she had to wring it out of her tall friend one word at a time. Luckily (for him) he got the picture and started the story as Mia watched with wide eyes and occasional sips from her glass.

To her credit, a part of her understanding that Jonah was already pretty uncomfortable and did not have the wonder of alcohol to loosen him up, Mia told her crude comments only to herself, and luckily was not yet drunk enough that she didn’t understand the sign Jonah had taught her which meant, in laymen's terms ‘telepath overload’. Mia couldn’t get the hang of signing and it irritated her a little, when she saw Robbie or Ginny start wiggling their fingers and making shadow puppets or whatever. But every time she tired, they were too big and strange and Jonah had told her she was shouting everything she signed.

Maybe he didn’t notice, but the expression on Jonah’s face had twisted into something much like a claustrophobic man locked in an elevator. It sounded, well, horrible. Not what sex was supposed to be like at all. Well, except the not thinking part. That was half the fun. But Mia wasn’t going to throw Jonah a pity party; he’d hate it and she’d feel gross. Instead, she just poked his hand and threw him a crooked smile.

”A year’s a year. Come on dude, don’t retire your junk just yet. Two years ago you hadn’t even kissed a girl...”

Her voice trailed off and the usually brash technopath took a quick gulp of cherry soda and bourbon. Ha, funny story that.. Liquid courage ingested, she cleared her throat. Had she been weirdly nice? Too nice, even given the whole ‘we almost got killed’ sort of thing? Fuck, it was hard. She couldn’t think clearly thanks to her wonderful drink, but if she was quiet too long Jonah would know (if he didn’t already) that she was being weird.

”Anyway, easy enough for boys to hide the virgin thing.” her smirk was back in place, and she’d fallen back onto her elbows to survey her gangly pal with mischievous eyes. ”You blokes don’t get all torn up,”

Dispute the sex talk Sean had given all the Hammelits, Mia had made sure to stress the... messier details to Jonah later that night. For his own good, of course.

But there was a final question she had to ask, before her brain literally exploded and showered Jonah with hot molton crazy.

”Who was it, anyway?”

[Jonah King]

Jonah had come to the conclusion after a few attempts to teach Mia to sign that she was just too text-based to learn how. It was as if her brain was wired in words and numbers, and that was the only way she could communicate – sign language was too abstract for her. She had never been able to grasp the idea of talking in images. An example – if you wanted to sign about two people meeting, you would do exactly that: make two ‘people’ with the index fingers of your hands, and bring them together – with your facial expression qualifying the emotion of the encounter. You didn’t just say: ‘two people met’, you said so much more than that. If you wanted to say ‘that class was exhausting – my eyes hurt’, you would enact a tired sigh, then mime – for instance – taking out your eyes and soaking them in cool water.

But that had been where Mia had struggled, even more so than forming the actual signs. The textual mind which served her so well when it came to technology was a drawback when it came to signing – there was a barrier between the meaning and the signing that she had never been able to overcome.

As much as he complained about it, though, Jonah didn’t really mind. Mia was the one person he really didn’t mind speaking aloud to, and that would do for both of them.

He gave a shrug and a nod to concede her point, too wrapped up for a moment in memories he hadn’t hoped to re-live to notice that she had been nicer than he would have expected. Unfortunately, he wasn’t too shell-shocked to miss her next comment, which elicited a horrified and indignant: ’Mia!’ Anyone else would have covered their ears in protest – Jonah covered his eyes and shook his head fervently. ‘Not an image I need!’ he told her, but he was stifling a chuckle all the same. He peeked out from between his fingers slowly, to make sure she wasn’t saying anything else disturbing, then grinned. ‘Maybe you’ve made me too nervous about it,’ he suggested dryly. ’You didn’t exactly make your first time sound like champagne and roses.’

That was one conversation he could safely have never had without it affecting his life in any significant way. Jonah still shuddered when he remembered it. Mia had made it sound like a girl losing her virginity was something akin to being torn apart.

‘Her name’s Cara,’ he replied to Mia’s question. ‘She’s not from here. We met in the holidays.’ Unsurprisingly, he hadn’t heard from her since he had completely frozen during her advances, then made hasty excuses and run away. That kind of thing didn’t tend to make a girl think you were a sane or sensible person to speak to again.

Looking over at Mia, Jonah’s gaze softened. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t say anything about it,’ he told her. ’I think I was just…embarrassed.’ It had been the first time he’d found himself unable to speak to Mia about something – but he hadn’t wanted to own up to being such a failure in that department. Far easier to just pretend that nothing had happened. With a smile, Jonah held out his hand for Mia to shake: ‘I promise that if anything happens, you’ll know within the hour.’ he told her. ’Or at least, within a day.’

[Mia Keystone]

”Dude,” Mia said seriously, ”If you have your first time with another virgin, you are way stupider then you look.” If Jonah was so caught up on how difficult it was, the last thing he needed was feeling the other girl’s pain when, well, she started bleeding. ”That’s just...” there were no words, she just shook her head slowly.

And her first time had been, well, painful but still fun. After she got over wanting to punch the guy in the face for it that was. ”Don’t you go blaming your chaste ways on me” she added indigently, smirking. ”I am a pillar of encouragement and well wishes.”

That was a dirty dirty lie, which they both were aware of. Mia was not into compliments or back patting, but she would mess anyone up who got in your way if she liked you, and you were assured the best technology aids money (well, not money) could buy (but not really bought either). Which was why Jonah had quickly learnt telling Mia anything from “that’s kind of pretty” to “you’re good at this” would be met with sarcasm and jokes at his or his mothers expense.

Still, Jonah had figured out (of course he had, the all knowing prick) what was actually bothering her about the whole situation, and he was giving her that stupid puppy expression. She frowned slightly, now well and truly tipsy, and lent against the wall. The cement was cold on her cheek but she was too interested in leaning to care.

”That’s stupid,” she said flatly, poking his arm. ”Don’t ‘pologise, just, you know,” she shrugged, which was not easy to do with one shoulder against the wall, ”hate secrets.” Which was obvious, given her usual passtimes. It was just, well, worse when it was Jonah.

”Hey, actually, hey Jonah,” Mia started, pushing herself up and groaning as her head swam a little, ”hey we totally had like, full body contact today! So you are so almost ready to knock boots with some broad!” She'd actually hugged him for like... five seconds without him flipping his shit and telling her that she was way too excitable and angry and all those other things that he seemed to get off her when he could decode her brain at all.

All this talk of sex was reminding her of something, and she knocked the heel of her palm against her forehead as she tried to remember. ”Oh, yes. That dance the school is having. I have plans. Many plans.” So many people to spy on, so much gossip to gather, so many fights to start. ”You take my friend Ginny. She’s not from Hammel, she’s a normie” which was a word Mia only used on Gin because otherwise it was stupid. ”She’s purdy too,” she added with a smirk.

The smirk soon faded because, fuck, Ginny was super pretty. And not insanely short. Well, too late now.

[Jonah King]

Jonah didn’t even want to think about what would be going through a girl’s mind when she had sex for the first time – still less did he want to hear it while he was doing the deed. Nothing would be less of a turn-on, especially as he had the feeling that it would mostly be: ‘It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, you bastard it hurts!’ Not exactly what a young man needs to hear when he is attempting to do something which should be fun. No, Jonah had already realised that he didn’t want to ever have sex with a girl when it was her first time. Did that make him selfish? He hoped not.

Nudging Mia’s knee gently with his, he offered her a small smile. No more secrets,[/b] he told her softly, tilting his head to try and catch her eye. I promise. For the most part, not telling Mia about things was more difficult than actually telling her, so it wouldn’t be a hard promise to keep. Jonah didn’t like secrets any more than she did – and since she was always so generous about telling him of her exploits…

’Yeah, but that was you,’ he pointed out in response to her comment about full body contact. ‘You’re…different.’ It wasn’t something he felt he could put into words. Shrugging his shoulders, Jonah tried to come up with some kind of plausible explanation, but couldn’t find one – he could just feel his face growing uncomfortably warm, once again. You don’t make my head feel like it’s going to explode, he wanted to say, but that didn’t sound particularly romantic.

Hang on. Who said anything about being romantic?

Oh.

Luckily – or unluckily, depending on your point of view on the subject of dancing – Mia’s next comment pulled him right up short. He froze, and stared at Mia for a long moment. ‘A dance,’ he said flatly. It wasn’t even a question. ‘You want me to go to a dance.’ There was a faint horror behind Jonah’s normally smiling eyes, and he looked at his friend in ill-disguised unease. His expression bore a distinct resemblance to the one Mia usually wore when she was trying to say: ‘Fuck no.’

‘I think your pretty friend has better people to go with,’ he told her. People who aren’t deaf, you mean? a nasty little voice asked, and Jonah bit his lip. If this Ginny girl was given a big lump of a deaf guy who wouldn’t dance and hardly spoke, what was in it for her? Given the subject of their conversation, it was unsurprising that Jonah should feel a little out of his depth. After all, they had just been discussing his complete lack of in-bed ability. ‘I think you’ll need to find her someone else.’

[Mia Keystone]

He was all soft sounding. Mia scowled and refused to meet his eyes; none of that. It was sappy, they didn’t do sappy. She didn’t do sappy and it was making her very very uncomfortable that he was trying it. Was she really being that pathetic that he had to sound like he was talking to a baby, or a sick kitten? Was she maybe exaggerating? Who the hell knew. They were both getting strange; it was like... like there was a smell or something in the room there hadn’t been before. Not a smell, maybe an elephant. Or a donkey, elephants were a bit too big.

And this donkey had big goggly eyes that were staring at her as it sat squarely on her bed.

The analogy was starting to sound more than a little insane so Mia scrunched up her face then released it, the tingling driving off the donkey. She was going to ignore it. She was going to ignore it and sit here and drink and eat Reece cups and everything would stay like it always had.

So when Jonah started going on about her being different, she looked up with a familiar smirk and cocked an eyebrow. ”Well that’s because I’m part machine, you know,” she said in the manner of a mother explaining to a young child that yes, fire was hot, and yes that meant that flame too. ”It’s just codes up there, after all.” He was blushing, and usually Mia would have poked fun at him but she was trying very hard to pretend there was nothing blush worthy about what they said so she just smirked a little more and shook her head.

Then, like a good strong wind does to fog, the new topic of conversation ripped apart the heaviness and blew it all away. Mia turned on her interpretation of a pout, which her and Jonah both and agreed made her look somewhat like a frog. ”Dude, come on” she whined, opening her already cartoonishly large eyes wider. ”Ginny’s great, and she knows how to do the,” Mia wiggled her fingers and knotted them together into such a mutilation of the sign for ‘speech’ that she had to laugh, ”that hand thing! Her friend Annie’s deaf I don’t know Annie, but Ginny wants us to hang out, anyway,” Mia steered herself back on track. Future hang outs could be planned later.

”The point is, you have to do this, or I may...” Mia paused and widened her eyes still further until it was actually painful and went for the most dramatic thing she could think of, ”die!” That was maybe a bit much. ”or do something really really stupid,” she added quickly, ”because I’ll be so out of control and crazy. I might shoot someone. Jonah, you would have a death on your hands!” Her voice was in ernest, even as the corner of her mouth twitched to hide a laugh.

”Come on, wont be any fun without you there, anyway.” She added, shrugging.

[Jonah King]

Jonah had let Mia talk him into doing a lot of things. So far, the only events he had vetoed had been cross-dressing (one she had attempted when they were fourteen – for some reason it had been integral to the plan that both of them be dressed as women. A flat-out ‘no’ had been the only response he had cared to give her, and eventually she had given up the campaign….under the pretext that his height would render the whole thing impossible. Mia hated to be refused), and one rather scary scenario involving a live circuit board and a welding torch. There was much that Jonah was prepared to do for his best friend – as evidenced by the events of the day – but so far, she had never asked him to dance.

Rationally, he supposed, she wasn’t asking him to dance. Not really. She was only asking him to attend a dance, which was something very different. Maybe dancing didn’t actually have to take place. He could hide in a corner.

As far as Jonah could see it, the options were:

a) Stay in his room, fixing something or watching a film.
b) Stand in a crowded, ill-lit room, struggling to lip-read in the dark and praying that nobody asked him for a dance.

He looked at Mia, and knew that he was going to have to take option b. If only to save his own sanity – he dreaded to think about what Mia would be like if he refused.

Truth to tell, he knew full well that Mia herself would not have entertained the notion that he would refuse. That was one of the things about Mia which made her so difficult to go against – she was so certain of her own victory that she would invariably make it happen, on the logic that she was always certain to win. If you didn’t consider losing, then surely losing wouldn’t happen!

‘Nothing can stop you doing something stupid,’ Jonah told her with a mischievous grin. ‘Especially not me. Remember Operation Bedside Lamp*? I tried to warn you…’

Her play-acting made him smile, although the idea of it being no fun without him prompted a raised eyebrow. Jonah was not known for bringing fun to parties – it was the reason he wasn’t usually invited to family ones. At least, that was the impression he got from his parents. But Mia could always wear him down, and eventually he shook his head and sighed. ‘I only have one suit,’ he warned her – and knew that she would take that as a yes. ‘What’s Operation Valentines all about, then?’

*Operation Bedside Lamp is like Fight Club. The first rule of Operation Bedside Lamp: you do not mention it. You do not speak of it. You do not even whisper the name, unless you want Mia Keystone to personally make your life into a living hell. Mia has been trying to erase it from her memory for years, and Jonah only ever references it when he needed an easy win during a conversation.
Paradoxically, while Jonah is the only person who can mention it without being killed, he is also the only person who knows it ever happened at all.
He’s still trying to decode Mia’s brain and figure out how that one works.